


You Need A Big God

by PossiblyNobody



Category: Critical Role (Web Series), Dungeons & Dragons - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Critical Role Rarepair Week, Fluff, M/M, Pre-Relationship, Sometimes weightlifting can be something so intimate, Touch-Starved, because that's what WE deserve, everything is soft and nothing hurts, lockdown - Freeform, vox machina - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 05:49:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,699
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27529486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PossiblyNobody/pseuds/PossiblyNobody
Summary: Vax and Grog try to survive a lockdown, the gym, and their feelings.AKA two touch-starved bastards inch their way towards a soft ending.
Relationships: Grog Strongjaw/Vax'ildan
Comments: 5
Kudos: 43





	You Need A Big God

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from Florence and the Machine because it kind of works for them? I don't know. 
> 
> Why am I forever stuck in rarepair hell? Suffer with me.

Lockdown was in its sixth month, and with the way England was handling it, there didn’t look like there was an easy end in sight. 

Vax had gotten through the first few months with surprising ease - he and Vex were both pretty introverted at the best of times, and his twin’s behemoth of a dog, Trinket (a Tibetan Mastiff) gave them both an easy excuse to be outside in the woods for an hour or two each day. 

They’d both luckily kept their jobs - Vex’s high salary job as head of logistics for the National Trust had been furloughed at 80%, meaning that she could do nothing at all every day and reap all the rewards. 

Vax’s job as a Security Consultant for private collectors was a freelance position that was rarely not needed, but had picked up now especially that more rich folks were home and suddenly increasingly aware of the valuable things they kept laying around. 

He could do most of his work from home through Zoom calls and then liaise with his various suppliers around the plans he had made when the time came. If anything, it meant that he could bill for more hours and make more once the final invoice came around, a fact he was keeping carefully away from his clientele. 

Plus the increase in remote working meant an increase in overseas clients, which he’d never complain about, gleefully adding an ‘American tax’ to some of them. 

They also had plenty food and toilet roll stocked up when the first wave hit. The food was a holdover from when they couldn’t afford even one meal and knew it was better to invest now in non-perishables in case the money dried up later. 

It was a habit that had kept them fed more often than not before they had any money, and a habit they hadn’t been able to kick even now that they had clawed their way upwards in their respective fields. 

The toilet roll was a beacon of forward planning by Vex, who didn’t want to pay for it when the demand inevitably increased and capitalism did its thing and made the price increase with it. 

So they waited out the first few months in what seemed like a blur - with mostly themselves and their various streaming subscriptions for company. 

Obviously they also FaceTimed Freddie whenever he left his lab (nothing much changed for Percy - his company was just as busy as ever, and he only ever left his inventing for board meetings, and those had smoothly transitioned to online at the beginning of March following the trends in the Asian markets a good few weeks ahead of the government advice. 

A fair few quiz nights and virtual movie nights with Keyleth, Scanlan, Grog, Allura, Kima, and Shaun on various rotations to keep the boredom away and to keep in contact had also popped up, taking the place of pub quizzes and actual movie nights. 

Pike was far too busy in the hospitals for any of their social events, but did short FaceTimes and Snapchat updates when she could. 

They tried not to show it visibly whenever they spoke to her, but seeing their little friend so exhausted, eye bags heavy but smile still bright, was harder than expected. 

They all tried to help her out where they could - sending food/care packages to her home, and threatening Scanlan with bodily violence since they shared a flat in the same apartment building as Keyleth - to stay indoors to not put their little friend in any more danger. The threats were mainly issued by Grog and Kima, but the whole weight of the group was thrown behind them, particularly after any of them had just come off a FaceTime with Pike and didn’t know what to do with their excess worry, they tended to just direct it towards reminding Scanlan to stay indoors. 

It was a threat he, for once, took seriously, and instead turned to TikTok. His status as a vaguely famous indie artist grew his audience pretty quickly on there, and he spent most of his days, or so his page seemed to show, learning new dances and composing parts of his new album, surrounding the pretend mythos of their group, Vox Machina (a name they drunkenly came up with at College that just… stuck). 

Grog fell into workouts, and surprisingly also TikToks - his time bodyguarding some VERY important individuals had set him up financially for life when one of the older charges had kicked the bucket and left him an inheritance. A strange move to be sure but the big man wasn’t complaining. He had shrugged and bought a large flat in Vax and Vex’s building and acquired a gym that ended up being used by the rich and the famous of their city. 

Obviously the pandemic meant that his gym was closed to the general public, but he wanted to help people with their at-home workouts, so he recorded easy-to-follow workouts for people from the comfort of his empty gym, putting flashes of the onto TikTok and full length follow-along versions onto YouTube. 

Luckily an extremely bored Keyleth volunteered to edit the videos, so they came off as semi-professional rather than the Comic Sans font that Grog definitely would have used for his titlecards. 

After going viral in a ‘GrogBodWatch’ hashtag last year when bodyguarding a high profile singer (and receiving a lot of Bodyguard jokes from everyone, Whitney Houston songs had never been more popular in those two months), it was no wonder that his workout videos were religiously followed and his TikTok followers list was beginning to make Scanlan paranoid. 

Vax had spent a little more time than he was comfortable with watching his friend lift various heavy objects, biceps straining under the weight, but lifting them seemingly easily enough. 

But more importantly than that for Vax, Grog had opened up use of his gym to all his friends - in time slots to keep everything safe. The big man was very strict on safety when he worked out that the best way to get Scanlan to follow rules and keep Pike safe was to lead by example, and the frequent threats of bodily violence, of course. 

They had to work out a slot where they could go in and make sure there would be no one there from a different household, and wipe down everything before they left. It was a fairly strict system, but it helped them all with the claustrophobia at more than one point during the lockdown. 

Vax had used it mostly for yoga, taking the empty gym to fully stretch out and not keep feeling self-conscious about accidentally hitting their coffee table or something. 

He didn’t let Vex come with to join him as she used his early morning slot to walk Trinket instead, and would go later when he would do his second walk of the day. Plus it was agreed by the both of them that if they had to spend EVERY waking moment together, they would definitely commit murder and would only have themselves to blame. 

Which wasn’t an issue in general but apparently Vex had been using HER workouts to start weightlifting, mostly freeweights, and had begun to see enough results that she couldn’t resist shoving it in her dear brother’s face. 

‘Oh look at that’ she crowed a week ago, flexing her bicep next to his, admittedly smaller, arm, ‘it’s a little pathetic really, it’s almost as though they won’t be able to tell we’re twins soon, with those noodle arms of yours’.

Haughtily, he tried to fire back: ‘Stubby, I could still lift you with ease, yoga gives me all the strength I need’. Which definitely would have worked if they hadn’t also been on a Zoom call with Percy at the time, who took a break from his work to lower his glasses and side with Vex, the rat bastard. 

‘Hate to say it Vax, but you’re looking pretty skinny lately’.

Hissing, ‘No one asked you Freddie’, he glared at the webcam, trying to convey the depths of his displeasure, turning away from the camera a little sulkily and pointedly reading a book while Vex continued on the conversation towards a different topic that he eventually rejoined.

But the fact remained that Vex was quickly becoming buffer than him. And while he didn’t begrudge her right to be as muscled as she desired, the fact of the matter is that they’re TWINS, and if he’s going to be continuously compared to her, he’d rather not be identifiable by his own lack of size, she already had him beat on general badassery these days, not that he’d ever admit it. 

So he booked in three extra slots a week at Grog’s gym so that he count start weightlifting too. 

How hard could it be, right? 

\----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Hard. 

Very Hard.

It turns out that avoiding all forms of weight training for most of his life meant that the muscles used in the lifting of heavy objects were vastly different to those used in his various yoga and running sessions. 

Not to say that yoga didn’t leave him with a full body ache, or that he couldn’t lift his own bodyweight in some frankly ridiculous poses, but this was a new kind of ache that left his arms out of commission the next day. 

He was a little worried that he was maybe doing it wrong and was going to accidentally tear something, especially without a spotter which mercifully kept him away from any of the particularly large weights. 

Panting and looking around the cold, deserted gym, Vax caught sight of himself in one of the full length mirrors across the room - sweaty, red faced, and ultimately defeated, Vax almost gave up then and there, if it weren’t for the spite fuelling him. 

So he came back two days later and tried again. 

And gave up again almost immediately. 

Admitting defeat for the day after having dropped three weights almost on his foot, and struggling to even lift half of them, he sat cross legged on the floor, systematically dismantling the bar. 

While sitting there feeling very defeated, the door to the changing rooms swung violently open, and Grog strode in with a towel slung over one massive shoulder. 

Before immediately freezing upon seeing Vax. 

He carefully put down his towel and bag, before rumbling out in his deep voice that reverberated around the empty walls and machines: ‘Sorry, I forgot you wanted more time this week, I can go?’

His voice lilted up in question, almost hesitantly, and he didn’t look like he was picking up his bag, he didn’t even look like he was looking at Vax. 

Vax half-heartedly lifted a hand in greeting, wincing at the ache in his arms and calling out across the gym: ‘We’re more than socially distanced right now big guy, but don’t worry I’m on my way out after failing spectacularly with your weights.’

Grog looked uncharacteristically uncertain, and all of a sudden Vax remembered that Grog didn’t actually live with anyone, and this might be the first time he was even seeing one of his friends in person since the lockdown began. 

So he dropped his hand into more of a beckoning gesture and invited: ‘Do you want to help? Vex keeps making fun of me so I can’t ask her, and I genuinely don’t know what I’m doing here’.

Uncertainty gone and now grinning a little savagely, his huge friend replied, ‘That’s because you’re puny. But yeah, stay over there and I can coach you from here.’ 

With that, he settled back onto a bench on the other side of the room, legs splayed and shirt stretched taut across his chest. 

Smiling back, trying not to stare at the V of his legs, and internally cursing himself for lining himself up for more weight-based torture, he easily threw back: ‘Of course, we can’t let Scanlan know that we’re in the same room or he’ll try and have a party.’

‘He’d better fuckin’ not.’ Grog said darkly, before gesturing towards the bar at Vax’s feet and telling him from the other side of the room, rather unhelpfully, that he’d put it together incorrectly. 

They spent two hours in there, the first hour was mostly Vax attempting to pick things up and Grog heckling him, before Vax got annoyed and snapped at Grog to do any better. 

Which he did… easily and with one hand. Vax tried very hard not to stare and immediately failed in that attempt. 

The second hour found them sat on opposite sides of the room, where Grog had rolled a can of beer over to him and they just talked a little, caught up without a screen in the way. 

It was… nice. In a gentle way that Vax wasn’t aware that Grog was capable of.

Obviously he had seen him be kind to Pike, but their style of kindness was to go drinking and sparring together, this was a quieter kind, of people just enjoying each other’s company in a shit time. 

Eventually they got onto the topic of Grog living alone, which Vax haltingly tried to offer up sympathy for and that Grog quickly waved off with an: ‘I would’ve murdered someone by now if I lived with them this long’, which Vax privately agreed to - if Vex wasn’t his sister, homicide would have looked even more tempting than it already did over the past 6 months. 

Halfway through an anecdote about Vex that Vax was gesturing wildly through and Grog was laughing boisterously at, a little alarm went on Grog’s phone and made them both pause and look towards it. 

After silencing it, Grog heaved a sigh and, holding up his phone as though Vax could see it from this distance, announced, ‘Keyleth is going to come through in 15 minutes, we’d better head out’.

Suddenly feeling a little bereft, Vax closed his jaw with an audible snap, before forcing it open to mechanically drink the remainder of the beer.

He stood up and stretched like a cat, feeling eyes on him. 

With a small, genuine smile to his larger friend, Vax offered up: ‘This was nice. Getting to talk in real life I mean,’ adding with a dramatic wink, ‘even if I feel like I should be offended with how far away from me you’re keeping.’

On the other side of the room, pushing himself up from where he was leaning against the wall of mirrors, Grog haltingly asked: ‘I mean, we could do this more often, yeah? You’ve got to keep up with Vex and we’re far away enough not to get each other ill, right?’ 

His face had a hopeful look on it under his lockdown stubble and Vax found himself inwardly berating himself again, this is why he didn’t used to hang out one on one with Grog, his inconvenient crush on the man always flared up after an hour or two. 

But that inconvenient crush also had him nodding his head eagerly (too eagerly) and agreeing to meeting back at the gym for the weight training excuse which Vax strongly doubted they would stick to since Grog tagged onto the end of the invitation: ‘Next time you’re bringing the drinks though’. 

They managed to duck out without being spotted by Keyleth and walked home together, which was only practical since they lived in the same building. 

Honestly it was a wonder they hadn’t thought of this before since walks were allowed. 

Even then they kept up a respectable 2m distance the entire way back, and got into the lift with their masks on. 

Getting off at different floors meant that Vax waved goodbye to Grog on his floor, crinkling his eyes in a smile that was just not visible through the mask.

With the door closing, Vax caught a glimpse of Grog doing an exaggerated wave back, and he couldn’t hold in the laugh that bubbled up out of him. 

He went back into the flat he shared with Vex and tried to not look forward to the next time too much. 

It didn’t work. 

\--------------------------------------------------------------------

The next time he was more prepared for both the lifting workout and the drinks afterwards. 

It really did help knowing how much Grog deadlifted in his SLEEP because it meant that that he wasn’t trying to impress anyone. 

He picked smaller weights and focused on repetitions, buoyed by the encouragement/heckling from Grog’s corner, and the other man leaned against the opposite wall, huge arms crossed while he surveyed his friend, not bothering to pick up any weights except to show proper form. 

It was strange Vax seeing Grog all by himself in this kind of place, before the lockdown had hit in March, they had slowly been circling one another – Late night drinking and gaming sessions and slightly wandering hands that never went far enough to be a declaration. 

Vax vividly remembered one night, about two weeks before the lockdown announcement, when Vax had been more drunk than usual during their movie night and had laid his head on Grog’s lap while they watched a movie, almost holding his breath to see what the other man would do, and then letting it stutter out of his chest when a hand came to rest on his head. 

Grog spent the next hour of the movie stroking his hair and neither of them spoke about it ever again. 

He thought about it though, quite a bit. Mostly when the loneliness of lockdown hit a little when he was alone in his room at night. There’s something different about someone you like giving you attention versus family members.  
Vax and Vex were as close as two people could be, but her braiding his hair didn’t give him the same thrill in the pit of his stomach that Grog’s large hand did just from resting it there, didn’t send sparks of anticipation down his spine. 

But, with the lockdown they were barely allowed to be in the same room as one another, and Vax had to rely on the slightly guilty thrill he got from bending the rules like this.

So they went ahead with it - surreptitiously booking out back to back slots so that they could sneak a few hours with one another without their friends knowing, and both refusing to think about why. 

And so it became a bit of a habit. 

And as the weeks went by, they spent less and less time by their respective walls, making an unspoken agreement to slowly start meeting nearer the middle. 

Or not so unspoken, as a few weeks in Grog idly commented on it, saying: Thank god you’re less jittery, I can actually hear you now’. 

Which Vax took a little affront to and made it known. He’d certainly been keeping his distance, but so had the other man. 

A few weeks later saw Grog sat criss-crossed on the floor, idly playing with a weight and rolling it surprisingly dexterously, and Vax on his stomach, head resting on his hands and watching the weight roll back and forth while some random Lo-Fi playlist played in the background.

Their conversation had petered out five minutes ago but they were both loathe to leave the other. 

Quietly, almost hoping Grog wouldn’t hear, Vax murmured: ‘I miss being able to touch you’.

And immediately regretted it, averting his gaze somewhere to the left of the freeweights, not willing to look at Grog’s face for a reaction. 

He didn’t have to wait long, and the reply came, just as quietly, ‘I miss it too.’

Head snapping up to try and meet his friend’s gaze he caught a little bashful smile on Grog’s face as he continued playing with the freeweights with his head down.

This should hopefully explain why, three weeks later, Vax made a dumbass move that could have ruined everything. 

\-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Three weeks after their little chat on the floor of the gym they had basically sat next to each other to watch a sneak preview of Grog’s latest YouTube video together and had walked back to their apartment building closer than ever. If he reached out a little Vax could have easily been holding Grog’s hand. 

Maybe that’s why he felt like he could push it further.

When they reached the elevator it was empty, and Vax with his mask still on was busy waggling his eyebrows at Grog, trying to make him laugh behind the new mask that Pike had bought him with little penguins on it. 

When the doors to his floor opened, in a brave but stupid moment, Vax ducked forwards to quickly hug Grog, relishing in how his head rested so briefly on the other man’s chest, feeling a fleeting moment on shifting muscles and body warmth before sprinting out of the elevator just before the doors closed, hearing an ‘OI’ behind him and laughing a little to himself.

He was still smiling when he got inside, waving to Vex who was on FaceTime to Percy again, and dumping his keys in the little bowl that Keyleth had made for them in an online pottery workshop that they had dutifully sanitised and put in a loving pride of place by their front door. 

He headed to the kitchen to grab some juice, still feeling warm (mostly inside) from the feeling of touching his friend freely after months of absence.

But his smile turned to a grimace as he read an incoming text from Grog as it popped up as a notification on his locked screen: ‘don’t do that again. We’ve got to be more careful.’

His stomach dropped a little and he gave himself a rueful smile, lips barely quirking up. Of course he misread things. Of course Grog didn’t actually want him back, the man barely wanted him touching him. 

Vax suddenly thinks back a few minutes and maybe remembers a flinch?

And promptly feels even worse about himself, basically accosting his friend in an elevator. 

Noticing her brother’s change of mood from her position in the living room, Vax hears Vex make her excuses to Percy and signs off, gesturing for him to join her. 

He does, and though he doesn’t want to talk about it and she doesn’t want to push, they do get riotously drunk together and watch old YouTube videos, which is just as good. 

The next morning Vax wakes to a hangover and no new texts from Grog. Not that he expected any from his boring reply of: ‘Ok,’ but it would have been nice. 

Instead he spends the next few days concentrating on a new contract that popped into his email inbox the weekend, throwing himself into the schematics of this new house and its woefully lacking security measures, ripping them apart with a vindictive glee of a man gently jilted. 

He also surreptitiously deletes his saved bookings for Grog’s gym for the next week while no one else is active in the Google Doc to see him do it. 

He can do yoga from home for a few days, and his burgeoning muscles won’t take more of a blow than his ego would if he tried to face Grog so soon after being rejected. 

Dramatic? Maybe. But on a scale of Vax, this barely ranked. 

The first session he would have missed flew by without him noticing, he popped Grog a quick text to say he wouldn’t be making it because of work and then turned his personal mobile completely off so that he wouldn’t have to see the response come through. 

Like an adult. 

He shouldn’t have worried, because Grog just confirmed (once Vax turned his phone back on) that he just used that slot to do some actual weight training, making Vax feel like a dickhead again for keeping Grog from his routine. 

The second session he missed he blamed on Vex and Trinket, saying that they wanted company, which also was accepted. 

\-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

By the time the third one came around, Vax assumed that Grog maybe got the message and that he wouldn’t have to send a text. 

He spent the time he would have been in the gym on various Zoom calls to suppliers, haggling the prices down for tech so that his personal profit could increase a little. Then he spent about an hour on Buzzfeed quizzes finding out what Sitcom he belonged in based on what sandwich he created. Just normal workday things. 

After the day ended, he showered and threw on some fluffy clothes. 

He was still in his vaguely wallowing state, but thankfully out of the drinking stage, now it was just fluffy socks, jumpers, and warm drinks. Self-care and all that. 

So it came as a bit of a surprise to hear a pounding at the door. 

Jolting and almost spilling his hot chocolate down the side of his mug (a misshapen affair, also courtesy of Keyleth’s pottery), he made his way to the door, calling out to Vex who had probably lost her key in a sing-song voice: ‘What’s the password Stubby? Or I’m not letting you and your bear-dog back in again?’ 

A deep voice that was definitely not Vex replied through the door: ‘Open up before I make you’.

Ah. Grog then. 

Opening the door one handed was a finagle but worth it to keep his mug in his hand, and once the door was opened to a strangely angry looking Grog, he returned his other hand to cradle the warm drink and look up at his friend saying: ‘Oh hey, sorry I didn’t make it today, work was crazy you know and –‘ he barely managed to get his excuses out before Grog leaned forward and rested a forearm on the doorway, effectively causing Vax’s voice to stutter out and stop, resolutely NOT looking at his arm. 

Ignoring Vax’s opening spiel, Grog just looked at Vax, near-blankly, before announcing: ‘Right then. You’re coming with me’.

Before turning around and walking towards the stairwell, not even checking if Vax was following. 

Vax stumbled halfway out the door before calling out to him, ‘I don’t have shoes on, I can’t follow you with lockdown rules and where are we going?’

Wrenching the door open, Grog turned back with a perfectly pleasant but slightly dangerous smile to say: ‘it’s not far, I checked with Vex that it’s okay to have you over, and my flat, any more questions or do I need to throw you over my shoulder and carry you there?’

Trying and failing not to imagine that exact scenario, he closed his apartment door and sock-slid his way to Grog, keeping a weather eye on his drink to make sure it wouldn’t spill, impetuously telling him: ‘Fine but I’m bringing my drink’.

Grin widening slightly, Grog just gestured up the stairs. 

After making their way up to Grog’s floor, thankfully only two up from Vax and Vex’s, Grog swung open his own door and ushered Vax in. 

The whole way up and through to his flat Grog had been keeping…close. Not uncomfortably so but definitely closer than they usually walked together.

Once they were in Grog’s flat, he grabbed Vax by the sleeve of his oversized fluffy jumped and tugged him towards the kitchen before he could enter the flat further. 

Grog took a step closer, and Vax took a step back towards the kitchen counter, then Grog took another and so did Vax, until he was backed up against it. Grog then just plucked Vax’s drink out his hands without a word, which for some reason he let him. All he did with the drink was put it to the side before returning his attention to Vax.

Who he picked up by the waist and deposited on the counter. 

Trying not to squirm at being manhandled Like That, Vax instead focused on the lingering of Grog’s hands at his waist, looking up sharply to meet his eye and bite out: ‘I thought you said not to do that again, or does that only apply to me?’

Sighing and taking a step back, the bigger man leaned against the opposite counter in a parody of their gym set up: ‘See I thought you’d understood me, but then Pike saw the message and thought you’d MISunderstood, and now I owe her a 20 pack of ale.’

A tiny flutter of hope came to life in his stomach and he promptly squashed it. 

‘And what, exactly, have I misunderstood?’

Smiling in a way that crinkled his eyes, Grog went to his wine fridge and brought out a bottle of red wine (the man was a savant with wine, but he usually preferred ale or mead except at special occasions), and began to uncork it. 

While twisting in the metal, he responded: ‘When I said ‘don’t do that again’ and all that you thought I meant ever – I only every meant that we shouldn’t on a lift where people could see that we’re breaking lockdown rules’ he pulled the cork out, making a satisfying pop as it did, and he waved the cork for emphasis before continuing:

‘See Pike got your reasoning right away but I didn’t until you didn’t show up for our second gym sesh in a row.’

Weakly Vax tried to defend himself: ‘I don’t think that’s quite-‘ but Grog cut him off again, pouring the wine into a decanter:

‘Yeah and when I spoke to Vex she said you’d been all sulky all week about something when I talked to her about us hanging out.’

It was Vax’s turn to interject: ‘Yes but’ (he privately winced at his easy agreement to all that) ‘how is this even allowed?’ gesturing wildly to the room at large.

Setting aside the wine decanter and grabbing a couple of glasses from a cupboard right by Vax’s head, staring at him intently for a second before backing off again, Grog continued: 

‘Well that’s why I spoke to Pike. She gets more of the health stuff than me and she said I’m a single household so I can have a support bubble, plus’, he looked proud of the next part: ‘I checked with Allura about the legal thing and she said the same – since I’m alone and you’re with family and there’s been no other mixing, we’re all good.’

Trying to wrap his head around it all, Vax started idly swinging his legs back and forth, asking: ‘but why go to all the trouble?’

Shaking his head, Grog stepped close again, ‘Stupid question’ before sliding a hand to rest at the back of the juncture of Vax’s jaw and neck and leaning in to seal his mouth over Vax’s in a kiss.

It was soft, softer than Vax had imagined in his weaker moments, warm, gentle and finished far too soon. 

Grog slowly swiped his thumb over Vax’s jaw and he couldn’t help but to lean into the touch with half lidded eyes. 

Murmuring: ‘shit okay, makes sense’ to his larger companion he swayed forward, only to be surprised when he stepped away again, this time to collect the decanter and two glasses in one hand and extend the other out to Vax to help him hop down. 

‘I did that out of order, I was meant to ask if you wanted to have a date with me tonight first and be all respectful all night and maybe kiss you at the end if it was good’

He sounded like he was reciting something from memory, and he probably was. 

Still, Vax would put himself down as ‘reluctantly charmed’ by it all, and grabbed his hand, trying to sound nonchalant while replying: ‘If that was you asking, I’d not say no to a date tonight, seeing as you already opened the wine’.

Swinging their hands a little, Grog led them further into his apartment, where he’d decked out his living room to be an aesthetic dreamscape: fairy lights draped over the sofa and chunky knit blankets with some floor lanterns with pillar candles already lit and flickering over the view of the city that his highish-rise apartment gave.

Forget reluctantly charmed, Vax was near-swooning. 

They chose a random Netflix television show and settled into the sofa, Grog pouring him a glass of wine and offering him some popcorn from a still-warm bowl. 

Accepting both, he sank into the sofa a little more, attempting to wrap his head around GROG setting all this up for them. It didn’t quite match up with his image of the man, it was so romantic… he’d definitely been given pointers by Pike. 

Half-expecting it to quickly devolve into ‘Netflix and Chill’, he was pleasantly surprised when Grog decidedly did nothing throughout the first half of the film except throw his left arm around the back of the sofa (and, incidentally, Vax) to hold him closer and sip periodically from his wine, commenting on the show, a slow-paced horror. 

Relishing in the touch, he unabashedly wiggled in closer throughout the first episode, and pretty much gave up during the second. 

Setting his wine down, he didn’t even pretend to be coy as he repositioned himself to put his head back into Grog’s lap, a reproduction of the movie night so many months ago, but this time very purposeful and was vindicated when the arm from the back of the sofa rapidly repositioned itself to rest in Vax’s hair, idly stroking it. 

He could feel himself gently floating off to sleep, and accepting that he’d just wake up tomorrow in Grog’s flat, and while tracing figure eights on the other man’s thigh, staring absently at it, quietly said: ‘Successful first date then’.

He heard no reply but didn’t particularly expect to, just let his hand still after about 100 more nonsensical patterns traced on Grog’s thigh and closed his eyes. 

The sound of a wine glass being placed down vaguely registered, and then he felt a larger hand interlace with his own and squeeze softly. 

As Vax drifted to sleep holding his hand he heard a deep rumbling voice murmuring ‘don’t think this gets you out of weightlifting though, just cos I like you’. 

Well... damn.

**Author's Note:**

> First time writing Vax and Grog! We need more content for this pair I STG. 
> 
> Also I wrote this all in Comic Sans like a feral bastard.


End file.
